The best version of Luciano Acosta, D.C. United’s magic man No. 10, is a saucy Luciano Acosta. 

That’s the Lucho who defeats Junior Moreno in a little locker room game, the Lucho who turns on a swivel even with the ball at his feet, the Lucho who earned a spot on the best XI last year in the MLS. 

In a season full of asterisks, the Black-and-Red know — if they want to make a deep run in the playoffs and seriously threaten for the title — they need consistency two guys: No. 9 and No. 10. The bad news is that, through 11 games of the season, things have been a little bit up and down. Wayne Rooney bagged his first stateside hat trick back in March but has gone quiet now and then. Acosta isn’t tracking with his same production last year, and perhaps more than either of these two facts is the sense you get when watching the D.C. United attack for the first third of the season: it’s a bit, well, clunky. 

But there is good news, a couple doses of it in fact: 

1. Despite the clunkiness, D.C. United are well on their way to postseason play, which means they’ve got time to iron things out. 
2. Don’t look now, but Lucho may just be getting his swagger back. 

The brightness of the good news, though — this is something has been on the back of many of our minds for some time — is the contract status — is Acosta’s contract situation. 

‘We can dance if we want to'

FloFC's Steven Streff probably put it best in his analysis of the weekend win over Columbus, so let’s go straight to the source: 

Circling back to Olsen's swagger comment, here's a little stat from Saturday night that might show that Acosta is back to his normal self: After attempting just 14 dribbles in the prior three games, Acosta attempted eight against the Crew. He completed five of those, and while none of them directly led to any goals, it certainly felt like Acosta had found his rhythm back.

There are still a lot of questions moving forward regarding Acosta's future, but in the meantime United need to have him playing at his best. On Saturday, Acosta showed that after a tough month he can bounce right back to help United pick up wins.

Simply put, Acosta dazzled. He dazzled and danced. 

Time to check out some smooth moves from our 3-1 win over the Crew on Saturday! #DCU | #SmoothMove | @TSmoothieCafe pic.twitter.com/eEY0BX60cG

— D.C. United (@dcunited) May 6, 2019

Batman & Robin, or something like that

The most iconic D.C. United play last year — the Rooney-to-Lucho game-winner extravaganza — perfectly encapsulates what remains true: These are the two biggest difference-makers on this roster, and in a league in which not every team has the fortune to boast one of these types (let alone two!) Ben Olsen is assured every single game to have two guys capable of making the difference. 

We noted this fact in D.C. United’s 1-0 road victory over the Crew a few weeks ago: Rooney is the kind of player who turns that draw into three points for the Black-and-Red and zero points for Columbus. Soccer is a weird, luck-filled, somewhat ridiculous sport, a game in which 90 minutes of play that favors one team can be easily turned by one errant (or brilliant) pass. But having guys like Rooney and Acosta, guys with talent constantly on display, helps mitigate lost points. 

To be a title-threatening team, though, D.C. United need more than two good players on a solid team. They need their dynamic duo to be clicking with each other and with the rest of the side, because Olsen’s roster is as solid as they come, injuries notwithstanding. 

The elephant in the room

Then there’s Lucho’s contract, hanging over everything at the moment. There was the last-minute PSG transfer effort that ultimately failed at the end of January, and there have been rumblings and rumors since then, too. The Washington Posts’s Steve Goff puts it best: this is a “choose-your-own-adventure” scenario at the end of the day, because not much concrete has surfaced since the end of January.

Here are, essentially exhaustively, the options: 

1. D.C. United sell Lucho this summer when the European transfer window opens
2. Lucho signs a pre-contract with a European team and stays in D.C. through the end of the season (can’t sign a pre-contract with another MLS team)
3. Lucho lets his contract expire, then resigns with a team anywhere on the planet (including the MLS)
4. Lucho re-signs with D.C.

I don’t hold a doctorate in mathematics, but by my calculations that’s one scenario in which D.C. wave goodbye to No. 10 this summer (option 1), two scenarios in which a period of extended strained relations give way to No. 10 leaving at the end of the season (options 2 and 3), and a single scenario in which this ends with Lucho in the capital longer than this season (option 4). 

I have no insider information, and it doesn’t seem that anybody does. But to some extent it doesn’t really matter, because one of those four things is going to happen. It’s a storyline that, given the lack of information and developments, you can’t write about often, but we should check in on it every once and a while because it does, in fact, involve one of D.C. United’s best players. 

A third of the way through the season, United have done a good job weathering a flurry of injuries and adjustment to a new season to be in contention for the top spot in the Eastern Conference. They’ve got time to figure things out, time to let No. 9 and No. 10 connect with each other and the rest of the squad, but behind everything for this side is the delicate case of Luciano Acosta’s contract.